overcome.

the frida kahlo room served as a transitory spot for most, to grab their drinks and then move on. two freshmen lingered, though, making their rounds from bowl to bowl, sampling each one, gradually losing balance, cross-eyed and all. “bets on who’s gonna go down face first tonight? personally, i’ve got my eye on the tall, lanky kid. he’s winced with every sip. definitely a lightweight,” freya ascertained, bringing her own cup of magenta to her lips. a tiny grimace followed, not yet used to its’ stringency – might as well have been rubbing alcohol dyed purple. “twenty bucks he runs to the toilets or collapses. what’d you say?” @radopens​

Face pinched after taking a sip of her drink - she’d inhaled sharply and everything, holding in a deep breath like that’d help with the taste - Rosa turned with the same pained expression to where Freya was pointing, “Oh - he doesn’t look good. He looks like Bella, when Edward was sucking out the venom in Twilight. So she wouldn’t turn - remember that? When her face got all weird and she went cross-eyed? That’s him. Bad news Bears,” Her high hadn’t warn off in the slightest. Reaching over, Rosa had taken it upon herself to grasp at Freya’s hand for no discernible reason, “Collapses. You don’t look like that and two-step it anywhere. Should we get him help?” Like she hadn’t asked in the first place, Rosa was ducking forward in the next moment, wide smile on her face. There’d always been something that felt magical about the intimacy of sharing a secret between girls, practically vibrating with it when she whispered, “Hey, I gotta tell you something. It’s juicy, I think you’d be proud of me. You, too - tell me something juicy, too,” she insisted, though there was no guarantee Freya even had anything she needed to tell Rosa.

He’s a bit disappointed at the lack of an Andy Warhol themed room at the party, as he was fully expecting to drunkenly stomp around it with Clark chanting SOUP! SOUP! SOUP! So, of course, they’d opted for the Kusami room instead, and ended up tiring themselves out pretty quickly. He’s graduated to the corner and is now taking an incredibly long sip of his drink, and he only notices someone else’s eyes on him when the contents of the cup begin dribbling down his chin, because he’s at that point in the evening. “…I meant to do that.” (@radopens​)

A little high and more than a little drunk, Rosa had awkwardly stumbled through the Kusami room for what felt like forever. She’d properly lost track of time by now, unsure of whether it’d been minutes or hours, brain muddy from being inebriated enough that she didn’t even have it in her to think to text the friends she’d lost. Instead, she found solace in recognizing Connor in the corner of the seemingly infinite room, plopping down beside him with a relieved, “Connor!” the same moment he was sputtering his drink over himself, “Nice,” Using the sleeve of her sweater, Rosa reached up to dab at the corner of his mouth. She didn’t really care about getting it dirty at that point, cuff already soaked in paint from when she’d dunked her hand into a vat of it in the Jackson Pollock room, “How fucked up are you? We could go find some water, if you want. I wouldn’t mind getting some. I’m kinda too scared to leave this place on my own, feels like a trap or something.”

“Nah. Fuck mermaids. Probably smell of… salmon. Gonna fuckin’… sashimi them. Bastards,” Jude got out with a vague gesticulation, some limp thing his arm couldn’t quite commit to. At her impression of him, he narrowed his eyes to a squint, molars clenched to keep his mouth in a vice – not that it was necessary, anyway, an inanimate thing, some malnourished prisoner no longer able to push up in his cell by the elbows. It wasn’t something he thought on but if he did, he’d realise he hadn’t properly smiled since Provincetown. That probably didn’t even count, anyway, chemical additives considered. Again, though, it wasn’t like he thought about it. Lately, it wasn’t like he thought much about anything. There was an empty train tunnel in his head, wind howled through. Rats scuttling along the rungs. A drip from the top brick he couldn’t be bothered to plug. “Bloody hell’s fuckin’… Harry Potter propaganda, Rosalind. Ron… fucked it for the rest of us, the scrawny ginger cunt.” Jude barely reacted as he always did, when she screamed. There could’ve been a fire blazing full throttle on the stove in the next room and Jude would probably still sit there idly smoking, ashing onto the carpet, eyes on a television only screening white noise. Staring through it, rather than at it. Staring at something else on the other side, something that held a lead weight in his chest rather than a name. Even her confession didn’t rile anything visible from him, not on the surface. I missed you. Dating Saskia, he’d come to see admissions like these as a cat dropping a dead bird in it’s owner’s lap, something with good intentions that was never well received. He’d never react the same but it still made him pause, remembering. He wasn’t sure what to do with it, words like an ornament he could only mutely stare at, something to appraise on a mantel and never interact with. 

Unconventional in the lax of his grip, his hand slid from her fingers to briefly sit a thumb on her wrist. Intentions unclear to him. Testing for a pulse, perhaps – seeking comfort in the thump of hers, the reminder that someone like her was alive. It slipped in barely a second, eyes cast down the roof’s slant where the teapot descended. He wasn’t particularly conscious of taking a seat, not even of the slates jutting his ass like the under-bite of an orc with jagged incisors. Instead, the moon took precedent: silver slicking the dew on the lawn, the gutter trembling with earlier rainfall, the crown of Rosa’s head. It illuminated all the edges of her, really. He thought maybe he’d like to paint it. “Fuckin’ hell, Rosalind. Just… treating me like man meat, weighed at the butchers,” he commented with no conviction when she raised his pant leg, pausing in a one fingered itch at the scruff on his jaw to watch her. “You about to take control? Make me, uh… cancan?” Eyes glinting with something unreadable, the compliment went by like water off a duck’s back, short pull of whiskey washing down the itch on his tongue – it wanted to do something, the longer he spent with her, some internal wrestle that might’ve made him grimace if noticed on somebody else. He almost felt guilty for it, at times, the places his brain went, stumbling so fast down the gutter he’d reached the sewer in seconds. Brow subtly furrowed in a bid to zone in, Jude took a moment to reach out and accept the card, unsure at first what it was he was looking at. From the way Rosa blathered, anyone would think she was attempting to sell a reluctant buyer on a steep six bedroom, not explain a sweet gesture. It made something inside him gently pang, staring at the Biro scrawl, extent to which she believed in him a bit overwhelming. He wasn’t typically a person of many words but he usually at least had something. Do you remember that day? He held onto the question like a glass marble, grasped gently in a fist so it wouldn’t roll or break. A thumb carefully skimmed the letters, moving at snail pace. He’d known a feeling like this, once, when Joyce brought him in from the hallways of his building – he’d been roaming to avoid going inside, slapping a pack of cigarettes against an open palm. The bruise around his eye was an unhappy accident, drunken elbow gone awry, but he didn’t realise how much it hurt until she called him in and sat him down, tending with a rag that dripped on his t-shirt. Being cared for. It was an extraterrestrial feeling. It was a feeling that, for as long as Jude could remember, had green skin and webbed feet, nothing he found familiar. He thought maybe it was nice, this feeling. He thought he could get used to it, if he knew how to trust it’d stay. 

“Vincent,” he repeated low, still touching the card like he had to assure it was real. Subconsciously wetting his lips, his eyes lifted to find her, silhouette still glowing like the moon had to highlight just how special she was. “Yeah, I…” trailed off, soft breath leaving his mouth – amused, sure, but for the most part, thoroughly, irrevocably fond. Do you remember that day? It was still clutched in his fist, he realised – the marble, the way she’d said it. He couldn’t put it down. “I, uh…” Studying her rather intently, he barely moved a muscle. He wanted to stay in this moment, for a while. If he stirred too much, he might forget the dream. “I remember all… the days, when they’re… with you.” He might’ve winced at the sentimentality in that, if it weren’t for her putting far more on the table – even so, his eyes averted, resting on her knee. “Has a ring to it, I think. Vincent. Vinny, if I’m feeling… Italian. If I eat, uh… a particularly… well done meatball.” Skirting past like he hadn’t said it. Typical coping mechanism. Regret was there, though, as soon as he did – part of him didn’t want to shy from it, the magnitude of whatever this was, was sick of heading the other direction when he saw a good thing coming. So, he didn’t. He looked it – her – right in the face, to the point that it probably felt like the prelude to a kiss, the part where the music swelled before the final crescendo. His eyes drifted all over, taking in everything. Acknowledging every freckle. “Thought about you, when I was away. Dunno if…” Faint twitch breathing life to his mouth at the corners, he just kept staring. He couldn’t remember a time where he’d wanted to kiss someone this badly in his life. “Dunno if I, uh… thought about much else, to be honest.” Jude paused a moment. “You, uh… You can let go of the whiskey, if you want. Don’t… give a shit about it, and…” faded at the realisation one of his hands had cropped up, dungaree strap held in the loop of thumb and finger. “Fuckin’ hell, Rosa.” It almost felt like a joke, how pressed he was for words, when, of everything, she was wearing dungarees. She could probably wear a potato sack and still elicit the same. “Think, uh… Think you should probably… have your hands free,” came before stalling a second, skim almost humming with it. “Bit shit being kissed, otherwise.”

As Jude appraised the contents she’d all but dumped onto his lap, a struggling weight of boxes on moving day suddenly tossed haphazardly onto the ground with relief, Rosa felt her brain zig zag between panic and alleviation. Jude’s company had been a ‘don’t know what you have until it’s gone’ situation if she’d ever experienced one. It wasn’t a week after he’d left for England at the beginning of the summer that she was coming up with the name for him, insistence on her boss looking over his art the following one. Like him no longer being a simple text away kicked her brain into hyper gear, itching for him at every corner. She’d eventually crawled into herself, a bit. Legs coming up so that her knees were by her chest, resting a cheek on one so she could gaze at him with a somewhat lopsided view - edges pinched so that it didn’t seem as daunting. It wasn’t seconds after she’d found herself in this position that she was perking slightly once more anyway, his words causing her heart to skip a beat and that feeling, the numb feeling in her fingers and toes, to return. She’d grown to love that feeling, craved it during the summer, but nothing had brought it back until now,  “Me, too,” she said, quickly, overly eager. She was always clinging to bits of affection like this when they came from Jude, which was something of amusement. Affections weren’t her thing in general, but even less so in Jude, it seemed - it felt like earning some sort of reward when he offered it up to her, either with a careful touch or his words. People had been less enthusiastic giving acceptance speeches at awards shows than Rosa was now, lapping up his honesty like a cat to a milk saucer. It didn’t feel dampened either when he turned the name into a joke, only acknowledging it with a teasing reprimand, barely a pinch to his wrist. It was just Jude’s way - Rosa had grown to accept it, if not become overtly fond by it. Everything he did, really, “Funny. You’re a funny man,” The way he looked at her then reminded her of the bus ride they’d taken together, one of the last days they’d spent in each other’s companies until now. She’d called him out for staring then, the equivalent of poking someone in their ribs when they least expected it to startle a squeak out of them. Jude always stared like he had nothing to lose, like he couldn’t think of anything better he wanted to do with his time. So she did the same. It’d always made her nervous before, being so carefully analyzed, but it felt more wrong than anything this time to even consider looking away.

“Better. I like to imagine I’m the opposite of a stress inducing individual. Your poems are appreciated, colour me charmed.”

“Hm. I don’t think I like this one very much.”

“I’m almost tempted to give Griffin a chance at this point. I’ve never met someone frothing at the mouth over another person more in my life. It’d be flattering if it wasn’t really, really sad. Funny, though, I like checking to see if he has a forehead vein that’s ready to burst every time I yell at him. Sure, Griffin, I’ll marry you if it’ll get you to remove your vacuum grip from my tit.”

“I can’t tell if this is real or not. Are impalas even particularly tame? Reveal yourself, I have many questions.”

“Connor, easily. He’s one of the coolest people I know. I’ve heard rumours that Griffin’s a cannibal. They’re just on different levels.”

“Yeah, but not very recently. We pretty much put our foot down and decided we should just be best friends and nothing more. Like, telepathically, though. We’re so close we don’t even need to use words, we just know.”

“I’d assume so, if kissing skills were anything to go by. This feels like a bit of a weirdly intimate question for me to answer, nonetheless, if you really want to know shouldn’t you ask him? Or at the very least someone who’s actually been with him. Not that I encourage that - it’s still weird all around.”

“Avatar the Last Airbender, hello. It was my favourite growing up, I still rewatch it sometimes. I think I’ve seen it all the way through, like, at least 10 times. Either that, or maybe Totally Spies.”

“And if I had? It’s not like it would compare to anything in real life anyway, it’s just a dream.”

“Sold the jewel. Thought it was shit, traded it for a kidney bean. Was, uh… ecstatic, planned on making a mean chilli con carne, but… Turned out to be a fuckin’… elf’s clitoris. Not, uh… Not sure how the merchant got her hands on those wares,” he sighed, expression grave – if he’d said something atrocious he didn’t seem to be aware of it, was never phased enough by anything to care. “Wasn’t part of my recipe, that’s… for certain. I’m just a baby boy.” He’d repeated the same phrase in numerous different circumstances. Once, a frat type in a Letterman jacket had reared his fist, to which Jude had monotonously said “ah, fuck, I’m just a baby boy, I’m just a little boy.” Stunned by not only this but the complete lack of rattle in his tone, the fact he’d stood unflinching as if waiting for a stoplight to turn red, it disarmed him enough to relax his grip. Allowing her ahead of him as he typically did without thought, his right hand suddenly felt listless, far too still – the same way an ex-smoker’s fingers might itch for something to occupy them after spotting a smoky bus stop. He didn’t touch the small of her back like he might’ve, before – it felt presumptuous, somehow, after a summer away, a summer spent watching someone he cared about not care about themselves at all. Still, the urge was there. He lifted the genie’s-lamp-come-teapot, spout to lips, and swigged the beer in an attempt to plug the hole in his chest – it was a hole he was sure anyone would fall into if they came too close and Rosa, at times, felt closer than anyone. He liked it as much as it made him tense. “Bit fuckin’ rogue. Who gave you the authority, Rosalind?” He wasn’t conscious of doing it, but he pinched at the fabric above her tailbone, at that, a scold not unlike a cat lifting a kitten by the scruff of the neck. Perhaps he was higher than anticipated, though, because he’d forgotten about the whiskey in his grip, cap poked to spine in rude awakening. “Fuckin’ hell… Re-calibrating… your posture. Fuckin’… chiropractor.” Blinking when she pranced ahead, the right corner of Jude’s mouth almost pulled. It reminded him of a conversation he’d had on a back terrace of a party, once, Rosa passionately engaged in debate about something trivial, expression nearly goofy as it was now. A guy beside him had nodded her out at a particularly rampant laugh, apparently seeing fit to try and bond with Jude by saying “bit strange, that one, don’t you think?” Jude, not bothering to look at him, had paused a moment before agreeing wordlessly, expression gone soft like it’d been a compliment. He excused himself after dropping the last of his cigarette in his cup, disgust ignored with his hands in his pockets. In Jude’s eyes, that stood her stark to everyone else. She glowed in the dark – for someone that saw everything in grayscale, neon like that had never felt plausible. “Fuckin’ hell… blown away. Very courteous. You, uh… you considered becoming a professional doorman? Think you’d suit the hat.”

Ducking his head – the house must’ve been an older model, because the frame was barely above six inches, short like a cottage – Jude squinted slightly at the musky smell. Anyone would think they’d stepped into an old attic, books laden with dust, mothballs abundant. The dim light was sliced through by moonlight, pale and thick as a block of cheese. “You got me two?” There was always an ache in his lungs but looking at Rosa brought another, a stick poke at a roadside possum who’d been previously assumed dead – it was nice, he thought, that feeling, a rare absence from feeling nothing at all. “Hm.” Furrowing his brow in though, he seemed to take the game seriously. “|One of those, uh… Russian… Sea Angel slugs? Love those bastards. I’d, uh… I’d be impressed, I have to say. Concerned, maybe. You, uh… You had him tucked in your armpit, this whole time? Bit fucked…” trailed off, giving her a look like he expected better. “Small vial of toxic sludge? That’s… Cor, Rosa. Really know… how to get me. That’s my fuckin’… favourite. Delicacy, that is.” Despite the exchange, he still moved towards the window, lump on the bed presumed to be a duvet gone bunched inside it’s cover – when Jude hiked a knee, thumping said shape and prompting an anguished groan, he sloshed some beer from his spout in protest. “Fuckin’ hell, wh… What’s… Hello?” Pawing a hole from which their head could poke, a bewildered partygoer let out an anguished sigh in response. “Everything’s fucked… She doesn’t want me.” Trading a glance at Rosa after they’d spoke, Jude subtly made a face. “Alright…” Then, he moved to undo the window’s latch. The bed bound Grandpa Joe stared out at them like a raccoon between trash cans, eyes practically burning over the lack of participation in their attention grab. Window shoved up, Jude tossed his teapot onto the slates like it’d land flat, only watching as it rolled to the edge and dropped straight off. A shatter below. Rather than acknowledge this lapse in judgement, he lugged over then extended a hand to assist Rosa in doing the same, slight breeze fluttering a thin t-shirt against his back. He continued their conversation like the stranger wasn’t there. “How about, uh… a beaded anklet? Think I’d, uh… Think I’d look gorgeous, with one of those. Strapping… Handsome. Glad you can agree. Nice, uh… Nice being on the same page.”

“Ugh, no. I don’t suit hats at all, Jude, I promise. It sort of makes me look like my head’s very... square. Just a slope. No curvature to it at all. Bonk,” If Rosa was known for anything, it wasn’t her subtlety. The second they’d poked their way into a rather cramped room, Rosa’s nose was wrinkling, a small eugh escaping her as she glanced around. The atmosphere reminded her a bit of what she’d imagined the tunnel to the Other World in Coraline had looked like before the movie had come out, left to worry over her own imagination. It’d subconsciously caused her to shuffle closer and closer to Jude, seeking out the safest comfort in that moment. Jude had always made her feel safe in a way that’d always leave her convinced she’d never felt a solace like it in anyone else for the rest of her life, “I don’t know what a Sea Angel is... isn’t that just a mermaid?” she asked, the slug part gone ignored, favouring to stay in a fantasy world. At his next suggestion, she attempted to feign seriousness - lips pressed into an unimpressed line and brows pinched together, school teacher disapproval. There was still a twitch to the corners, though, needlessly entertained by Jude’s deadpan humour, “Cor. Cor, Jude,” she repeated, gaudy and purposely horrendous British accent tacked on, “You’re the most British man alive,” Voice back to normal, before the accent was back, “Cor, bloody hell. No toxic sludge in sight, mate,” If she was being annoying, it went right over her head - she’d thought herself rather entertaining, but still, finally and for the rest of their conversation, slipped back to original tongue, “You’re not very good at this guessing thing. I can give you -,” Waiting for Jude to cross over the bed to the window, the sudden lump stirring caused Rosa to cut herself off with a high-pitched and unexpected shriek. Though she’d settle, she was still mildly on edge, and the random appearance of a human being disrupting their moment had her hands flying in the air, solo cup in her hand slipping out of her grip and splattering dark, red wine across the wall behind her, “Fucking - God, oh my god,” If Jude was startled, he didn’t show it. Rosa didn’t even have time to feel silly about it, eyes still wide and hand clutched over her heart, before Jude was nudging the window open, tea pot crashing to the ground below them. Scurrying forward and trying her best to feel less creeped out by the forlorn student slowly hiding themselves under the cover again, a hysterical bout of laughter bubbled out of Rosa as she reached to clutch at Jude’s hand and drag herself after him onto the slanted roof. Jude had always had an inexplicable quality to him that’d assured Rosa no matter what, he’d always keep her on her toes, “Christ, Judas. I missed you,” The sudden confession was so honest, she didn’t have time to feel embarrassed over that either.

Maggie was speeding rather recklessly on her bicycle, the campus path filled with hills that let her easily coast. If it wasn’t for a nearby robin that had caught her attention, forcing her to slow to a near stop, she wouldn’t have even noticed Rosa’s neardeath experience happening a mere two metres away from her. “Oh my — babe!” She dropped her bike on the grass next to the path, a sympathetic laugh leaving her as she approached. “I — Do you want a ride back to my car?” she asked. “You can just stand on my pegs and hold your skates. Oh my God your knees!” Maggie noticed, interrupting her own thought process with a frown. “Let me help you, this is so sad. Injured animal vibes.”

The second Maggie was coming in closer, Rosa was already reaching out to grasp at her, looking a bit like some pathetic baby animal pawing desperately for their mother. She probably did look a bit pathetic as it was - Maggie even pointed out she seemed a bit like some injured animal, “I made a mistake, Mags, I totally, obviously, fucked up. I’m no athlete, I’m not the superhero I thought I was,” Rosa had already forgotten about the state her knees were in. Once she’d clutched onto Maggie’s hand, she changed a glance down, flinching at how scraped up they were. Apparently, knee pads weren’t in her vocabulary, “Yeah - yes, please,” Without any grace or elegance to her actions, Rosa almost immediately plopped to the ground, falling just a touch too roughly with relief at the idea of getting out of her skates and heading home with Maggie. It made a zing of pain shoot up her tailbone, flinching before shooting her roommate a perfected puppy-dog look, “Will you help me take them off? Please? I’m dying, Maggie, I’m so weak.”